Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether the Government has considered piloting or introducing an exemption to childcare funding rules where a relative is a registered childminder meeting all regulatory requirements.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Parents are free to choose the childcare that is right for them and their children, and childminders are not prevented from caring for related children.
However, the restriction on funding relatives is set out in the Childcare Act 2006. Section 18(4) of this Act specifically excludes care provided for a child by a parent or other relative.
Allowing childminders to receive funding for looking after related children would not be an effective use of public money and may have a negative impact on the viability of existing childcare businesses.
A local authority can choose to fund a childminder providing childcare for a related child, but this would have to be from local authority funds independent of the dedicated schools grant.
Although childminders cannot receive entitlements funding for related children, flexibilities within staff to child ratios can be used to enable childminders who are caring for related children to avoid limiting the income they can earn.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether the Department plans to review the eligibility criteria for government-funded childcare for children cared for by qualified and Ofsted-registered relatives.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
Parents are free to choose the childcare that is right for them and their children, and childminders are not prevented from caring for related children.
However, the restriction on funding relatives is set out in the Childcare Act 2006. Section 18(4) of this Act specifically excludes care provided for a child by a parent or other relative.
Allowing childminders to receive funding for looking after related children would not be an effective use of public money and may have a negative impact on the viability of existing childcare businesses.
A local authority can choose to fund a childminder providing childcare for a related child, but this would have to be from local authority funds independent of the dedicated schools grant.
Although childminders cannot receive entitlements funding for related children, flexibilities within staff to child ratios can be used to enable childminders who are caring for related children to avoid limiting the income they can earn.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure schools are promoting reading as a substitute to social media use.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
We know that reading for pleasure is hugely important and brings a range of benefits. However, we also know that just one in three children aged 8 to 18 read in their free time, and a recent Omnibus Survey by the department found that 31% of parents of primary-aged children and 40% of parents of secondary-aged children said their child prefers spending time online or playing video games, citing this as a barrier to encouraging reading in their free time.
We have launched the National Year of Reading 2026, in collaboration with the National Literacy Trust, to address long-term declines in reading enjoyment through engaging new audiences, reshaping public attitudes and building the systems needed to embed lasting, meaningful change.
The National Year of Reading encourages everyone to see how reading, in all forms, can unlock more of our existing passions and interests, from reading a story in a print book or on an e-reader, to reading a magazine article or an online blog, to listening to an audio book on a phone or tablet. With this in mind, digital technology is not incompatible with the National Year of Reading.
The national rollout of Best Start Family Hubs is underpinned by £500 million of government investment to help families in every part of the country. This includes increased investment in home learning and parenting support in the early years, enhancing support for families through integrated advice, targeted outreach and partnerships to empower more parents and carers to chat, play, and read with their children every day to nurture early reading skills and language development from birth.
This government is also providing £5 million of funding for secondary schools to purchase books to encourage reading for pleasure, as well as committing over £10 million in funding to guarantee a library for every primary school by the end of this Parliament.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she is taking steps to provide financial support to families to support reading among children.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Our ‘Giving every child the best start in life’ strategy outlines how we will invest in supporting children’s language and literacy, including continued funding for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention and the introduction of specialist early language leads in local areas from the 2026/27 academic year.
The national rollout of Best Start Family Hubs, underpinned by £500 million of government investment to help families in every part of the country. This includes increased investment in home learning and parenting support in the early years, enhancing support for families through integrated advice, targeted outreach and partnerships to empower more parents and carers to chat, play, and read with their children every day to nurture early reading skills and language development from birth.
Our National Year of Reading 2026 aims to address long-term decline in reading enjoyment and is focused particularly on priority groups including boys aged 10 to 16, parents from disadvantaged communities, and early years children and their caregivers.
This government is providing £5 million of funding for secondary schools to purchase books to encourage reading for pleasure, and over £10 million to guarantee a library for every primary school by the end of this Parliament.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps he is taking with local authorities to improve the quality of local housing stock.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Everyone deserves to live in a decent, warm, and comfortable home.
The government recently consulted on both the content and implementation of a new, modernised Decent Homes Standard. The consultation outcome can be found on gov.uk here and the impact assessment on gov.uk here.
We also consulted on new Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards for both the social rented and private rented sectors. The social rented sector consultation outcome can be found on gov.uk here and the private rented sector consultation outcome here.
The first phase of Awaab’s Law came into force for the social rented sector on 27 October. Awaab’s Law is vital legislation that will empower social tenants to hold their landlords to account using the full force of the law if they fail to investigate and fix hazards within their homes within set timescales. It will also allow tenants to access the Housing Ombudsman if their landlord does not adhere to strict timelines for action.
The government has also committed itself to bring forward new regulations this summer to bring the conclusions of the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS) review into force. The HHSRS is the cornerstone of housing standards, and the forthcoming regulations will make it more efficient and accessible for experts to use, and easier to understand for landlords and tenants.
We are also acting to ensure private tenants have safe, warm, and decent homes including strengthening local authority enforcement in respect of unremedied hazards and applying Awaab’s Law Act to the PRS through the relevant provisions in the Renters’ Rights Act.
The government is also supporting improvements to existing homes through the Warm Homes: Social Housing Fund, which has allocated £1.29 billion over 2025-28 to support social landlords to make energy efficiency improvements to their homes.
Over £1 billion of building safety funding will also be available between 2026/27 and 2029/30 to accelerate remediation of social housing. These targeted funds are in addition to the 10-year social housing rent settlement that will improve providers’ financial capacity to invest in new and existing homes.
The government is also supporting estate regeneration schemes to transform neighbourhoods and deliver well designed housing and a better quality of life for tenants. The new Social and Affordable Homes Programme will also support regeneration schemes that provide a net increase in affordable homes.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans her Department has to expand access to practical trade-based qualifications within mainstream secondary schools before the age of 16, including through partnerships with further education colleges and local employers.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
There are 46 key stage 4 Technical Awards, which pupils can take alongside GCSEs. These qualifications cover broad sector areas such as health and social care, building and construction and support the development of knowledge and practical skills.
In 2024/25, 45% of students in state-funded schools took at least one Technical Award. The Curriculum and Assessment Review emphasised maintaining stability to allow these qualifications to embed fully in the system and did not propose significant reforms to change delivery or uptake at this stage.
School careers programmes introduce pupils to technical and trade occupations early. Under Provider Access legislation, schools must provide at least six opportunities for pupils in years 8 to 13 to meet technical education or apprenticeship providers. The Schools White Paper also sets out the department’s commitment to broadening pupils’ horizons by ensuring access to high quality careers advice and two weeks’ worth of work experience for every secondary pupil.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure GPs are equipped to effectively signpost men facing mental health challenges to appropriate services.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
General practitioners (GPs) are responsible for ensuring their own clinical knowledge remains up to date and for identifying learning needs as part of their continuing professional development. This activity should include taking account of new research and developments in guidance, such as that produced by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, to ensure that they can continue to provide high quality care to all patients.
All United Kingdom registered doctors are expected to meet the professional standards set out in the General Medical Council’s (GMC’s) Good Medical Practice. In 2012, the GMC introduced revalidation which supports doctors in regularly reflecting on how they can develop or improve their practice, gives patients confidence doctors are up to date with their practice and promotes improved quality of care by driving improvements in clinical governance.
We are expanding NHS Talking Therapies which provide psychological support for people with a common mental health condition like stress, anxiety and depression. More than 670,000 people completed a course of Talking Therapies treatment last year and through the 10-Year Health Plan, 915,000 people are expected to complete a course of treatment by March 2029. Individuals can be referred by their GP or can self-refer.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that mental health charities are adequately supported in the North West.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Mental health charities make a hugely valuable contribution to the health and wellbeing of local communities around the country, including in the North West.
The 10-Year Health Plan set out our commitment to build a Neighbourhood Health Service. This will be integral to how we work in partnership with a full range of public services and other partners, including the voluntary, community, and social enterprise sector. Effective partnerships between these groups will be crucial to better understand and meet the needs of individuals and local populations in a holistic way. This will deliver more preventative, local, personalised and digitally enabled care.
Transforming the system will take time, but we are committed to delivering a new approach to mental health. Six community-based 24/7 mental health centres are now operating across England, including one in Copeland, Cumbria. These centres provide open access to treatment and support for adults with severe mental health needs. The centres intend to improve continuity of care, drive down waits and reduce inpatient admissions. They are in the heart of communities and involve multidisciplinary working between psychiatrists, mental health professionals, peer support workers, and voluntary sector staff.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that patients who have functional neurological disorder have access to rehabilitative physiotherapy.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England’s updated Service Specification for Adult Specialised Neurology Services, published in August 2025 and due to come into effect on 1 April 2026, sets a clear expectation that neurology patients, including those with functional neurological disorder (FND), should have timely access to the full range of inpatient and outpatient specialised rehabilitation services. Service specifications define the minimum standards all commissioned providers must meet, helping ensure consistent, high‑quality care across England.
FND is also specifically included within then guideline on Rehabilitation for Chronic Neurological Disorders, reference code NG252, published by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in October 2025. This guideline aims to improve access to consistent, multidisciplinary rehabilitation for children, young people, and adults with neurological conditions, including FND. We expect clinicians and commissioners to take full account of the guideline when designing and delivering services.
In addition, the National Neurosciences Advisory Group (NNAG) developed an Optimal Clinical Pathway for FND, providing commissioners and clinicians with a clear model for person‑centred, multi‑professional rehabilitation involving neurology, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, and psychological support. The pathway emphasises timely assessment, consistent communication of diagnosis, and coordinated rehabilitation across primary, community, and specialist services to reduce variation in access.
As part of wider community provision, NHS England’s Standardising Community Health Services framework sets out the core community health services that integrated care boards should consider, explicitly identifying community rehabilitation for people with neurological conditions as a core component of local service planning. This supports better access to ongoing rehabilitation following diagnosis.
Asked by: Elsie Blundell (Labour - Heywood and Middleton North)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of reviewing the enforcement processes of the Child Maintenance Service.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service has a range of strong enforcement powers that are designed to get money flowing quickly, prevent the build-up of arrears and ensure children get the financial support they deserve. These powers include the ability to deduct directly from the paying parent’s earnings or bank accounts and disqualifications from holding or obtaining driving licenses and passports.
The Government has announced our intention to reform the Child Maintenance when parliamentary time allows system. We will remove Direct Pay and move to a single, strengthened Collect and Pay system which will allow the CMS to monitor all payments, identify missed or partial payments immediately, and take faster enforcement action. Ahead of this change, the CMS is already moving non-compliant parents more quickly from Direct Pay to Collect and Pay.
In March 2025, CMS established a process to manage high- and medium-risk cases using predictive analytics, resulting in earlier identification of at-risk cases and enabling caseworker intervention at the earliest opportunity where indicators of non-compliance are identified.
To further improve arrears collection, the CMS will introduce administrative liability orders to replace the current court-based process. This will streamline enforcement, reduce delays, and help the CMS act more quickly against parents who avoid their responsibilities. Work with HM Courts and Tribunals Service and the Scottish Government is underway, and regulations will be brought to Parliament as soon as possible.